Moving our Tiny Home for the First Time
So if you follow us on social media (specifically Twitter or Instagram) you would have seen us moving our tiny home for the first time this past weekend. We were lucky that Steve’s parents (who were full time RVers for over a decade) volunteered to come down to Tucson and help us work through our checklists and relieve our minds. Honestly we weren’t too worried about most of the moving process, except for hitching and unhitching the Airstream from the truck, but they caught a number of things that we either didn’t think of or weren’t doing quite right. Nothing that would have ruined our move, but things that would have been seriously annoying.
We hitched up Charlie to Clifford Friday morning and drove about 10-15 minutes down the road to another full-service campground where we unhitched and setup at our new home base. Then on Sunday morning we did it all again (this time with a much better checklist and with Steve’s parents looking on but not participating) and moved back to our original campground but to a new shady spot (just in time for our 1st forecasted 100+ degree day this weekend). While not relaxing, the weekend certainly was not stressful and in fact I think overall it was exciting. It showed we can do this and soon we WILL be doing this whenever we want. Now the hardest thing is to stay put for the rest of the year. You can be sure that on any upcoming weekend that is cool enough we will be out boondocking somewhere in Southern AZ, just because we can and now we know how.
I hope you enjoy our video montage of our move!!
Thanks for sharing the video. I dream of living in an RV once we hit our FI goal but as I have never stayed in one before I am clueless as to what it entails. So glad your first move went well and that you have Steve’s parents around to help guide you through the process.
Now for a complete newbie question, I noticed there were electric meters at the site. When you pay the site fee, does this include all water and electric or do they charge an amount on top of the flat fee based on your actual usage?
Thanks for the question Mrs. SimplyFinanciallyFree! I had never ever camped even a night before moving into our Airstream so believe me I’ve asked every newbie question there is! As for what you pay at a campground it generally depends on how long you are staying. Most daily/weekly rates include EVERYTHING (water, electricity, sewer, and possibly wifi and cable). Monthly rates are quite a bit cheaper but they do NOT include electric so your usage for the month would be tallied up and you’d be charged accordingly. Most of the time right now we are on a monthly rate so we’re pretty frugal using our electric. For a few days last week we were on the daily rate so we were going hog wild with the A/C 😉 Some campgrounds might be different so it never hurts to ask but in general this is what we’ve seen for full hook-up sites. Hope this helps you plan for your future RV travels!
This is certainly good information to know when estimating costs. I will certainly be looking to you if/when we do ever get an RV.
Just to get some perspective – How much are the daily and monthly rates generally ?
Good question, Vivek, but unfortunately I don’t think I can answer it. It depends is probably the best answer. Rates change by season, area, park amenities, site type etc.
I can give you our numbers though. Right now we are staying at a KOA (which is like a resort RV park). We have laundry facilities, bathrooms, two pools, two hot tubs, a dog park, a gym, bocce ball court etc. It is also off-season in southern AZ because it is so hot. We were originally in a back-in spot (the cheapest) for ~$500 a month (this jumps to $775 come prime season in the fall). We are now in a premier shady pull thru spot which is costing us $600 a month this jumps close to $900 in prime time I think. Daily rates here range from $25-$45 a day depending on season. In general this is pretty pricey (at least compared to what we plan to do once we hit the road) but we don’t plan to stay at ritzy resort like parks like this much in the future. Some state parks with hook-ups can be as low as $5-$10 a night and of course boondocking is often free. These are our numbers but honestly since we haven’t started traveling much I don’t know how well they hold in general. Hope this helps.
Courtney – This is exactly what I was looking for. Thanks for the reply 🙂
PS: Baring the state parks, the costs are much higher than I imagined !!
A checklist! LOVE! What a great idea. Thanks for sharing the details about utilities–this is helpful. We’ve camped a lot, but never for a month or more, so this is great info. 🙂
I’m a checklist QUEEN…but in this case almost all the full timers we’ve talked to recommend the lists for the first year or so. It’s easy to get caught up and forget something tragic. I’m officially Safety Officer too. O the POWER 😉
Thanks for the video. I will show my wife and I am sure she will want a check list. She will probably want it in a specific order.
I always love to glean ideas from others. I will be looking for a cover for our Q grill now, and ‘attempt’ to clean it each time.
A couple of suggestions, you can use your awning pole to latch your street side awnings if you don’t want to get your ladder. Sometimes when I am using the true stinky slinky, not the Sewer Solution, I will use gloves and I store them in the refrigerator access panel along with some sewer connectors.
It will be great to meet you guys on the road sometime.
Hi Roger
Your wife sounds a lot like me. I love having lists and part of the weekend was figuring out what order things should go in. I’m changing up my list since not everything should be done by room for instance.
Thanks for the suggestions. It’s funny we used our awning pole to lock up the big awning but just didn’t think to get it for the smaller one. Next time! We’ve also thought about getting gloves for handling the stinky slinky but for right now Steve’s fine with doing it last and then using a Clorox wipe on his hands. We’ll see if that changes as he starts having to do it more once we’re on the road full time. Lots of learning to be had!
We will definitely have to try and meet up on the road! Have a great weekend!
Congratulations on the first move and loved the video 🙂
Thanks Vivek! 🙂
Wow… What a nice and cool RV you have in that case you can travel anywhere with your house HAHA.. I have quick question, is there designated place to park the RV?